


In the Shadow of the Smuggler's Moon

by La_Catrina



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Frottage, Light Angst, Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, holocrons, the most fun a pair of space virgins can have without taking their clothes off
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-30
Updated: 2018-09-30
Packaged: 2019-07-17 18:59:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16101794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/La_Catrina/pseuds/La_Catrina
Summary: While on an undercover mission with the Resistance on Nar Shaddaa—and after months of radio silence—the bond between Rey and Kylo Ren reopens.After a bounty hunter blows her cover, Rey must escape the infamous moon before the First Order is alerted to her presence. Too bad there's a certain Supreme Leader who isn't keen on letting her get away so easily. And the Force really wants her to find an ancient Jedi artifact.





	In the Shadow of the Smuggler's Moon

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to all the mods over at the Reylo Fanfiction Anthology for organizing and beta-ing this whole event! And thanks to [punkeraa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/punkeraa/pseuds/punkeraa) for the beta help and also just in general for being a great friend.

_Once you’ve been to one cantina, you’ve been to them all_ , Rey muses, swiftly navigating through the crowd of bodies pressing against her. A thick cloud of cigarra smoke hangs over _The Orange Lady_ , catching the dim light and casting it in a dreamlike haze. The scent of stale sweat and bitter liquor permeates the air as a live band plays, loud and jaunty, in the enclosed space.

Rey spots Finn across the room with Poe, their own gazes scanning the room as well. They wear plain, nondescript clothing; dark leather jackets and long pants, the better to blend into the crowd with. Their mission is simple, in theory. The largest moon orbiting the Hutt’s home planet of Nal Hutta, Nar Shaddaa, is a criminal underworld rife with black market weapons dealing. It was the perfect place to acquire weapons without the prying eyes of the First Order. All they had to do was go in, meet with their supplier, exchange their credits for the promised shipment of X-wing starfighters and plasma plasters, and avoid any run-ins with the Hutt’s.

When Rey had asked Poe why the Hutts specifically, the corners of his lips had quirked up.

“You don’t want to mess with a Hutt on a good day. But this? Not getting the Resistance tangled up with them? It’s personal, in regards to the General.”

And then he’d grinned for real, a certain spark lighting up his eyes. “Remind me to tell you the story about the General and Jabba the Hutt someday.”

Navigating the criminal underworld of Nar Shaddaa, Rey found, was as precarious as the shifting sand dunes of Kelvin’s Ridge. Ephemeral alliances were made and broken and soaked in blood. Turf wars fought over the most profitable spice dens, the most lucrative black markets, and always, that desperate, wrenching need for _more_ that vibrated in the Force.

Their intel led them here; to the Corellian Sector. It hung among the higher levels of the moon’s vertical cities, miles and miles above its core. The surface of the planet seemed as grimy and caked in filth as the lower levels. Still it remained for the most part free from the Hutt’s influence, with other less than savory patrons taking up residence in its cantinas and casinos.

Sleek chrome slides beneath Rey’s fingers as she arrives at the bar. It lays against one end of the room, the entrance to the cantina at a perfect angle to watch patrons come and go. She squeezes between a tiny Chadra-Fan, their furry bat-like ears twitching at the din of conversations that surround them, and an irritated looking Duros, claiming an empty stool for herself. Turning her back to the bar, she angles her head towards the front doors and—more importantly—towards Finn and Poe.

Rey inhales, lets the smoke-tinted air fill her lungs, as she lets the Force expand out from her. Behind her mind’s eye, the physical appearance of the clients melts away, replaced instead with shimmering prisms of light. Their shine is dimmer here, on the Smuggler’s Moon, as if a veneer of dirt covers everyone.

_How strange_ —she wonders— _to be on a planet so alive to the Force, and yet dead to it._

The contrast is like a blade.

It’s difficult, sifting through the millions of emotions and energies that surround her, the vast majority of them unpleasant. Rey pulls her attention inward, shrinks her perception to this sector, and then smaller still, this can—

The bartender, a heavyset Zabrak with sharpened horns, slams his palms onto the table behind her, warns Rey that _if she isn’t going to order anything, then she’d better move along for someone who will._

“I’ll have whatever he’s having,” she answers, nodding at the Duros to her right without a single glance back at the bartender. This is a convenient look-out spot and she cannot afford to be kicked out. A moment later, a glass clinks, barely audible of the din of the cantina, as her drink is set on the counter behind her.

“Special of the house,” he growls.

Rey scans the crowd again, but there’s still no sign of their contact. And then, suddenly, she feels the tips of her fingers tingle, eyes widening as a decidedly familiar presence awakens at the base of her skull.

“Kriff,” she swears, as all the air is sucked from the room and the clamor of the cantina fades away like the last wisps of morning fog beneath the midday sun.

Kylo Ren, Supreme Leader of the First Order stands less than five feet away from her. Rey stares at him, can’t help herself, at the shadows beneath his eyes, dark as bruises. At the long scar that runs across his face and the black cape that spans the width of his shoulders. This is the first time that the bond has opened in nearly ten months, not since she closed it off after the battle of Crait, with Kylo on his knees before her.

Kylo’s own eyes zero in on her face, gaze flitting across her form over and over, as if he cannot believe she’s there before him. She’s forgotten what the full brunt of his attention felt like, how the intensity of his dark eyes caused the blood to rush in her veins. But then the anger and heartbreak crawl their way up her throat just as quickly. This she hasn’t forgotten, how deeply the pain of his decisions on Crait had cut.

“Rey,” he whispers, the leather of his black gloves creaking as he clenches and unfurls his fists.

A Twi’lek walks through him, his body as ephemeral as mist, and Rey blinks, the disruption enough to break her from her trance. What matters is the mission, and she’s already wasted too many nights thinking about Kylo, about what could have been if only he’d chosen to come with her that night on the Supremacy. Her lips flatten into a grim line as she cuts her eyes away from him and swivels back around on her bar stool.

“Is this your tactic now? Ignoring me?” he asks, his voice echoing someplace behind her shoulder. She can’t see him, but she can hear the dull thump of booted feet as he approaches her.

Kriff, was this a mistake? If he tries to touch her—does he dare touch her?— would he become visible, like that night on Ach-To? Rey can not think of a worse outcome than the Supreme Leader making an unexpected appearance at _The Orange Lady._

For a moment, Rey swears she feels a warm breath of air against the back of her neck, causing the fine baby hairs at the base of it to stand up. And then it disappears, as Kylo walks through the bar counter to plant himself in front of her once again. Her eyes fall to the silver countertop instead, taking notice for the first time of the drink she has ordered. The cocktail seems to be made from a kind of deep blue liqueur, served in a cut glass chalice that makes it shine like a sapphire.

“You know as well as I that we have no control over this. If we are seeing one another—,“ he says, “—it is because the Force wills it so.”

Rey ignores him, focusing once again on detecting any danger that might threaten the Resistance. She runs a finger along the rim of her drink, to give her hands something to do.

“Ah,” she hears, the sound intrigued. “What hole in the wall have the rebel scum relegated you to?” He takes a step closer, intent on the drink in her hands, a myriad of emotions flickering across his face, cycling too quickly for her to pinpoint any one specifically. He settles on disappointed, in the end, although Rey has no inkling why.

“If you’d accepted my offer you’d be somewhere green right now, not on whatever backwater outer rim world you’re lurking on.”

“Don’t do this,” Rey hisses, under her breath, mindful of the companions on either side of her.

Kylo’s eyes harden in the dim light of the Orange Lady.

“You told me I wasn’t alone either—“ he stops, the pale line of his throat working as he swallows. “But you turned your back on me, just like everyone else.”

Rey jerks off her seat, incensed, drink forgotten as a red-hot flush crawls up her cheeks at the audacity of the words coming out of Kylo’s mouth. She pushes her way through the lumbering crowd, heading towards a darkened alcove at the far end of the room. Even without turning around she knows Kylo is following her. Once semi-hidden behind the walls of the alcove, she glares up at him, fighting to release the anger that licks along the edges of her spine.

“That’s not fair and you know it, Kylo,” she retorts.

He flinches, blink and you miss it, but undeniably there. Rey wonders if it’s because she didn’t call him Ben. For a moment, she had contemplated it, lips poised to form the shape of his true name. But that wasn’t it any longer, was it? He’d made his choice, as she’d made hers.

“You’d have had me stand by and just _watch_ as the First Order killed my friends?” Rey shakes her head, “If you thought I’d stand by and do nothing then you really don’t know me.”

“So you chose to save a band of terrorists instead of—what? Letting them all disappear in order to build something new?” Kylo seethes, a muscle in his jaw ticking as he clenches his teeth.

“New? Last time I checked you were still leader of the First Order, using intimidation and terror to rule over people. It’s the same thing, even with Snoke dead.”

“You’re wrong. Rey, If you’d stayed, together we could have done away with it all. Built something better from the ashes,” he insists.

“I don’t want to watch the galaxy burn. Snoke’s gone. You don’t have to rely on your pain anymore.”

Kylo raises an eyebrow, “Perhaps for a lightsider. But the dark side has always relied on the full breadth of our emotions. Even more so the negative ones.”

But it was beginning to dawn on Rey that the Force was more than just the dark and the light. She could never achieve the sterile connection to the Force that the Jedi Order of the Old Republic had enforced. She could no easier erase her pain and anger than she could eliminate the love she had for her friends. But it was difficult, not letting the darkness overwhelm her.

What Kylo spoke of was the other extreme of the spectrum, darkness with no light.

“If all you have is the dark side Kylo, one day you’ll wake up and find you have nothing of yourself left to give.”

He opens his mouth to rebutt her, but a shift in the Force catches her attention. _Danger_ , whispers something in the back of her mind; that sixth sense which had kept her alive on Jakku blares to life now, as she feels the butt of a blaster jam into the space between her shoulder blades.

“Don’t move,” whispers a vaguely female voice, scratchy and distorted by the vocoder of a mask. “Did you really think you could come here, to Nar Shaddaa, and not have anyone recognize you? Rookie mistake, little Jedi.” The blaster digs in harder, hard enough to bruise and the body moves closer behind her. “Now be good and I’ll bring you to the First Order alive.”

“Rey? Rey what’s happening?” demands Kylo, as her energy in the Force spikes. He stares at a distant point behind her shoulder, unable to see anything besides the stoic look that has fallen over her face.

“I’m not going anywhere with you.”

“A pity. Your head will still bring me a pretty amount of credits.” The click of the safety switching off echoes in her ears as Rey rotates her body to the left, quicker than the eye can follow, turning to face the bounty hunter as her hand shoots up, shoving the blaster skyward as a bolt shoots forth. A crash reverberates through the air as the blast hits metal, and suddenly the rest of the world rushes back in, like the ocean after high tide— and the bond snaps close. Screams fill the air as patrons avoid falling debris, _and now their undercover mission has gone to hell._

Rey brings her opposite arm over the hunter’s forearm, wrenching down, weakening their grip enough to dislodge the blaster from their hand. She grabs her new retractable quarterstaff from its hiding place against her thigh, the solid weight of the metal feeling good in her hands. It isn’t the same as her saber—not nearly as satisfying— but that still lay cleaved in two, the broken shards of the kyber crystal refusing to cooperate beneath her fingers.

She half turns and half steps back, towards the door, a fluid quarter circle, shoulders and all. And like she knew they would, the bounty hunter reaches for another blaster and lunges for her, a little slower than Rey, furious and disoriented, ready to shoot. Rey lets her go long enough to establish momentum, and then she whips back in reverse towards them as she swings the quarterstaff with all her strength behind it. It’s muscle memory at this point, from countless brawls on Jakku, each swing meant to take someone down, and the solid thunk of metal hitting against a body rings in her ears. Rey’s only peripherally aware of the other patrons scrambling to move out of their way.

The quarterstaff catches the hunter’s outstretched hand, blaster sailing, while a second jab catches her across the face. Her body topples backwards—unconscious. And then that prickling feeling returns, and on instinct, Rey shoves her hand behind her, and the blaster bolt aimed at her back arcs widely away from her, pushed by an unseen hand. A hush falls over the bar as dozens of people stare at her, at what she’s done.

If they hadn’t know who she was before, they know now.

She catches Finn’s panicked eyes from the corner of her vision, his hand outstretched as if to help her. Rey’s thoughts race; they all have bounties on their heads, word would spread about the Last Jedi on the Smuggler’s Moon, but no one has recognized Finn and Poe yet. She can’t stick around for someone to notice them. She has to leave, distract the crowd and draw any attackers away. She shoots him one last look, trying to convey to him across the space between them that she knows what she’s doing. Rey bolts her way through the exit doors, out of _The Orange Lady_ and into the neon blue lights of the Corellian sector.

 

* * *

 

 

Rey draws the hood of her cape more tightly around her face as she makes her way down an unknown street. Lamplight reflects off of noxious puddles of black liquid that pervade the avenue. She pulls the edges of the coat over her lower face, covering her nose to muffle the fetid stink. She’s made her way down, descending into the lower levels of the Vertical City and leaving behind the trendy hotels and casinos of the Corellian Sector. After the fight with the bounty hunter, she’d run until her lungs had burned and when she’d spotted one of the repulsorlift garbage scows that floated from level to level, she’d hitched a ride on one without hesitating.

Now, miles of buildings loom above her head as they block out the night sky and cast the lower zones in perpetual night. Not that it matters much, Rey doubts anyone would have been able to see any stars, the pollution was so thick. She can’t feel anyone following her as she makes her way past the red-lit spice dens, past grubby diners and black window shops advertising the best weapons this side of Nal Hutta.

Rey passes a neon-lit store when the Force hums around her, and all of a sudden it feels as if a string is hooked to the inside of her ribs, yanking her towards its entrance. A sign that reads _Antiques and Oddities_ in crooked aurebesh letters blinks above her, casting her face in alternating pink and green glow. What does the Force want her to do? She contemplates going in, but then a group of huddled figures to her right begin whispering, casting furtive glances in her direction. Deliberately, as if she had all the time in the world, Rey turns away from the shop—and the insistent pull of the Force—and walks away. Eventually, she comes upon a modest inn, not quite as dilapidated as a couple of the others she’s come across. There’s only a single sentient humanoid at the counter, eyes struggling to remain open as they track Rey’s approach.

“One room for the night.”

“Ten credits then.”

She fishes the money out of her pocket, handing it over to the receptionist. He hands her the room key, and a couple of minutes later the door to her hotel room beeps open as she slides it through. It opens to a plain nondescript room: just a bed, a dresser, and a small standard issue refresher. A breath rushes forth from her lungs, letting the tension she’s held tight in her muscles since she stepped out of the _Orange Lady_ release. Her communicator beeps then, shrilly, shattering the silence as she pulls it from beneath her coat.

“Finn?” she asks.

“Rey?! Are you ok? Where are you--what, what was that back at the bar?” he answers, concern ringing in his voice.

“There was a bounty hunter that recognized me. She knew who I was, but I don’t think anyone else noticed you and Poe. It’s too dangerous here, the mission’s been compromised and you guys need to get off. I can leave on a different transport.”

“What? Not happening, where—” his voice cuts off.

“Is that her?” she hears, indistinct and muffled, and then Poe’s voice fills the room.”Rey, how are you doing?”

“Fine,” she sighs. “I’m ok, but the mission’s a bust and you and Finn need to get out of here.”

“What about you?”

“Don’t worry about me, I’ll find a way off, but we can’t be seen together,” she says.

“We hightailed it out of there right after you, but the city’s crawling with bounty hunters. We’ll try our luck in the morning. You someplace safe, kid?” he asks.

“More or less,” Rey huffs, peeling back the viewport curtain to stare out at the blinking lights and smoke of the city before her.

“We’ll rendezvous on Dennogra as soon as possible. If anything changes let us know.”

“Will do,” she responds.

A moment later Finn’s voice comes back on, “I’m not in favor of this plan, just so you know. I think splitting up is a bad idea, especially in a place like this.”

“We don’t have much of a choice, Finn. I’ll see you guys as soon as I can.”

“You’re right. Stay safe, Rey, night,” Finn’s voice cuts off and plunges the room back into silence. Rey lets her cape fall onto the floor as she crawls into the bed, eyelids heavy with sleep and faint pangs of the Force still echoing in her head. Between one moment and the next her eyes slip shut, and her breathing evens out.

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

_This is a bad idea_ , she thinks, standing outside the antique store from yesterday, the same pink and neon green lights alternating in dim flashes. It felt almost like she was back at Maz’s castle; that strange compulsion that had pushed one foot in front of the other to lead her to the Skywalker saber. Rey gulps, mind flicking back to the visions she’d been thrust into once she’d touched the legendary weapon.

She hopes this isn’t nearly as unsettling.

Rey steels herself and walks in, the smell of cigarra smoke and dust filling her nose the moment she crosses the threshold. There are towering aisles stuffed to the brim with strange metal contraptions, antique blasters, and now obsolete holopads. Rey ignores them despite the niggling scavenger instinct which cries at her to look at this veritable mountain of treasure that lays before her. Instead, she follows an unseen trail that leads her deeper into the store. She can feel it stronger now, more insistently, like a homing beacon.

There! Just beyond that door, she’s sure of it, that’s where the Force is leading her to.

“What do you want?” someone snaps.

Rey blinks, her concentration breaking. The door is actually behind a long counter, and behind the counter stands a wizened Togruta, brown skin wrinkled and tough. His eyes rake over her, that look of someone sizing up a potential customer—or a potential thief. Rey stands up a little straighter.

“I’m looking for an antique. Unusual and—”she reaches out “—and quite old. Do you have something like that?”

The Togruta narrows his eyes, arms crossed over his chest. “Maybe, maybe not.”

“I have credits, _and_ I’m interested in buying.” He doesn’t make an effort to move. “Or maybe I can take my business somewhere else,” Rey says, gaze locking onto his, a silent battle of wills.

In the end, the Togruta breaks first.

“I’ll see if I have anything you might like,” he says and shuffles into the back of the store through the open door. He comes back a moment later, an old necklace held aloft between his fingers, and immediately she knows this isn’t what the Force wants her to find.

“No, not that. Something—something strange, maybe something you’ve never seen before.”

The Togruta sneers at her but nonetheless does as she's asked. Anticipation simmers beneath Rey’s skin, and the next time he steps out her breath catches in her throat.

_Yes_ , the Force sings, _this is for you._

He carries a strange crystal lattice device in his hand, the metallic inlays scratched and dulled with age. “Came in on a shipment from the Unknown Regions not too long ago. I’m not sure what it might have been used for, I can’t get it open. Only know it’s quite old. Five hundred credits, take it or leave it.”

Rey only just hears him, eyes trained on the mysterious device he holds in his hands. Recognition flashes across her mind; she’s seen this, or something close to it, in one of the Jedi texts. She still hasn’t been able to translate what exactly the book was trying to say, but this, this is without a doubt a step in the right direction.

She swallows, “Actually, you think this is junk. I’d be doing you a favor taking it off your hands.” His mind struggles under the Force persuasion, fighting to shake it off. “ _You don’t need this_ ,” Rey concentrates, enunciating every word, imbuing the words completely with the Force. For a moment or two longer the shop owner resists, and then his grip on the object slackens, gaze going distant.

“I don’t need this.”

“And you won’t remember me coming in.”

He repeats the words back to her, tone wooden. Rey reaches for the metal structure, fingers a hair's breadth away—breathes deeply—and grabs it. There are no visions, no strange and haunting voices echoing in the Force, not even that pull of the Force that had drawn her in the first place. Just an ancient piece of metal and glass, nestled tight in the palm of her hand.

Now that she has whatever the Force pulled her to, it’s time to find a way off this moon. She’s long outstayed her welcome. Rey leaves the dazed shopkeeper behind, exiting the antiques store into the fetid stench of the streets outside.

Rey sets a brisk pace back towards the inn, hood pulled down over her head so as to block her face from view. She’s almost there, just passing the entrance of a darkened alley when between one moment and the next a hand clasps onto her arm, hauling her into the shadows. Rey yells, bucking and twisting against the iron grip around her arms. The outline of her attacker seems to meld with the darkness, a mass of black nearly indistinguishable from the obscurity of the alley. Rey kicks out with the heel of her foot, the power behind it enhanced with the Force as she aims square for the knee of the hulking figure in front of her. Her aims lands true, but despite a muffled hiss of pain, he doesn’t let go.

“ _Rey_ ,” he says, and she freezes—she would recognize that voice anywhere, the specific cadence of her name coming from that mouth even muffled as it is beneath a mask.

_Impossible, there’s no way that it’s him,_ she thinks. But the heat of his body is real, the grunts of pain echoing in the space between their bodies, the pressure of his hands on her body. Kylo Ren has found her, among the hundreds of planets in the galaxy, among the millions of inhabitants of the Smuggler’s Moon—he has found her. She wrenches backward, twisting her hands palm up and force pushes him away.

_Away, she has to get away._

“Rey, stop!” He lunges for her, fist gripping the tattered edges of her cape. She scrambles for the clasp at the base of her throat, relief surging through her when it snaps open and the pressure slackens. She’s halfway back into the sickly yellow light of the street when a clatter sounds against the floor of the alleway. Rey whips around, only to find Kylo’s masked face tilted down, staring at the odd contraption.

“Where did you find this?” he breathes out, voice muted behind the blankness of a metal mask.

Rey’s hackles rise. It’s not the same one from Starkiller Base, this one plain; just a sheet of black plasteel in an oval shape and a single line of silver inlay across the eyes.

“I’m not talking to you with that thing on,” she grits out.

A pause—and then— Kylo reaches up and slides it off, shakes free the dark waves of hair that escape from behind the confines of the mask.

“I didn’t want to be recognized,” he explains, as he bends to pick the object off the ground.

Rey’s breathe hitches in her chest at seeing his real face for the second time in nearly a year. Should she cut her losses and run, with the way his attention otherwise occupied for a few, precious seconds? The Force had called her to the device, but what good would it do if she was a prisoner of the First Order? Familiar regret rises in her, a valuable haul lost, whether to fate, danger, or other scavengers, but gone from her hands nonetheless. But she isn’t a scavenger anymore, hasn’t been for a long time, she’s a Jedi, and she’ll survive without this strange lattice structure. She has to go, warn the Resistance the Supreme Leader is here and find a way for herself to escape.

“Do you know what this is?” he asks again, peering down at this palm.

“I have an idea,” she replies.

“You’ve somehow found a holocron, one of the sacred repositories of ancient knowledge,” his eyes flick up to meet hers, gauging her reaction. “I could show you how to use it.”

“How did you find me?” Rey replies instead.

“This place is a monument to the galaxy’s capacity for depravity and corruption, and it’s reflected in the Force. They all feel as if they’re coated in a layer of filth,” he scoffs. “But not you. Perhaps somewhere else it would have been impossible, but here you—you shine so brightly in the Force.” Kylo shakes his head, “You are impossible to ignore, all I had to do was follow.”

Rey looks at him, really looks at him, doing her best to ignore how the awe on his face twists her stomach into knots. He looks exhausted; stray strands of hair stick to the sides of his face, he’s wearing a set of plain black robes when he could be dressed in the finest silks of the galaxy, and the slight tic under his right eye has returned. Where is his battalion of stormtroopers, of armed guards?

She can’t quite believe he’s come alone.

“And now that you’ve found me, what do you plan to do? Take me back in chains?” she asks.

“The bond, when it cut off, who was it?” And now it’s he who ignores her question.

“A bounty hunter,” she replies. “Thanks for that, by the way. I can’t set foot on a single planet closer than the mid-rim without seeing a bounty poster with my face on it.”

Kylo has the gall to look uncomfortable, “Captured alive and unharmed. I wanted to do away with it entirely, but Hux pushed for it. It would have appeared suspicious if I didn’t.”

“Didn’t feel like I was going to be ‘unharmed’ when that bounty hunter had her blaster pointed at my back,” she growls. It had thrown her off, the first time she’d landed in a nondescript city on some mid-rim planet and seen her face broadcast across the hangar bay with an astronomical number of credits listed as a reward for her capture. The truth had hit her then, that this was Kylo’s doing, under his command, final and absolute, her face transmitted across the galaxy for all to see. “And since when do you take council from Hux?” she continues.

“Since I realized he holds the reins of the military. Snoke gave him too much control and now it’s near impossible to take it back. Him and the other military generals in his pit of vipers,” he says. They both startle at the sound of creaking metal, and Rey looks down to see the holocron nearly crushed in Kylo’s clenched fist.

“I’m serious about my offer,” he says, unclenching his hand. “Only someone sensitive to the Force can access holocrons.”

The urge to tell him off rests on the tip of her tongue, but she catches it at the last moment. Kylo seems to have come alone, which admittedly doesn't mean much, as she’s sure there must be a _Star Destroyer_ in some system nearby, ready to come to his aid at a moment's notice. But—the Resistance is here, still. He wouldn’t be half as lenient on them if he caught them. She needs to keep Kylo focused on her and warn them they have to get out of here as quick as possible.

And a small, treacherous part of her _is_ intrigued. Translating the Jedi texts has been arduous, slow going work, and Rey has spent many nights hunched over the ancient books, reading them until her eyes burned from exhaustion. If she could open this holocron and gain important knowledge, would it be worth it?

She hopes so.

“And why shouldn’t I alert every criminal here to the fact that the Supreme Leader is on Nar Shaddaa?” she asks, arching an eyebrow.

Stray light from a nearby streetlamp casts half of Kylo’s face in sharp relief, the other half remaining in shadows, still partially hidden in the alley. “What good would that do you?” he asks her, voice pitching lower.

Rey grins, “The Hutt cartels were never overly fond of the Empire. I can’t imagine much has changed with the First Order. So I’ll come with you, but if you try anything we’ll both be in for a bad time. You maybe more than me.”

“Fair enough,” he answers, slipping the mask over his face and the holocron disappearing into the folds of his dark robe. “Follow me.”

Rey hopes she hasn’t just committed a huge mistake.

 

 

* * *

 

 

The repulsorlift hums quietly as it drives them higher and higher up the levels of the hotel. As far as hotels go, it’s quite a bit nicer than the modest inn she’d stayed at the night before. They’d returned to it briefly for her to retrieve her pack. In the privacy of the fresher she’d typed a harried message to Finn.

_Kylo Ren is here, no indication he knows of the Resistance. Get_ offworld _now. Don’t worry about me, I’ll meet up with you later._

And then she’d ground the butt of her staff into the communicator, crushing it and flushing the pieces down the toilet.

Now the congested skyline of the Vertical City zooms past them. She hasn’t spared a glance at Kylo since they got in, but she’s aware of him all the same. The breadth of his shoulders seem to shrink the space in the repulsorlift, and she hears the soft sounds of his breathing. Rey’s mind wanders to the memory of another repulsorlift, the one on the Supremacy when they’d been on their way to face Snoke.

How sure she’d been of Ben Solo’s return.

You can’t think of that now.

That remains in the past, and so she pushes those memories away. They step out onto his floor as the lift dings, walking side by side towards his room. Rey scans the area, taking note of any windows or emergency exits. She’s not sure what will happen after they open the holocron, but she has an idea. Kylo inserts the key to the room and the door slides open, revealing a spacious suite, sparse but clean. Purple light from the city outside bathes the room in violet shadows.

The door clicks shut behind her.

“How do you know what this thing is?” she asks, walking further into the room.

Kylo takes a moment to answer, sliding the black mask off again. “Hundreds of these existed at the height of the Old Jedi Order. Their main temple on Coruscant had a holocron chamber where they housed them.” He curls his upper lip, as if tasting something unpleasant. “Skywalker used to traipse across the galaxy searching for these and other antiques of an order long gone.”

Rey’s whole body stiffens, and just like that the mention of Luke brings back the memory of Crait. Kriff, what is she doing here? She should have run when she had the chance.

_But you didn’t_ , whispers a voice in her head.

“Did you ever find any?”

“Not many. One or two. After the Jedi purge, Palpatine sought out any remaining Jedi artifacts that had escaped the destruction of their temples across the galaxy. He wanted to erase the existence of the Jedi from history.”

“Isn’t that what you want?” she says, bitterly.

His lips open, then close, but no words come out. Kylo chews on the inside of his cheek, mouth pursing as if he is trying to parse out his words carefully.

“Not to you,” he says at last.

No, not to her, but isn’t that the problem?

“Just show me how to open it, Kylo.”

He blinks rapidly, turning away from her to reach into his discarded robe to pull out the holocron, and she has the absurd notion that she’s hurt him.

_Good,_ she thinks, _satisfied. He’s hurt me, too._

And then she regrets it, the second after thinking it. The dark side pulls at her, seeking the cracks in her composure, seeking out her pain. Rey lets herself feel it, the ache in her heart, counts to three, and then breathes out, struggling to release it.

“Holocrons can only be opened by someone highly attuned to the Force. All you need to do—,” he says, placing the dodecahedron shaped structure in her hand, “—is concentrate and feel the Force through you, and it.”

Rey closes her eyes, expanding her awareness, opening herself up to that unending and resonant energy. She feels Kylo beside her, his Force signature chaotic; a roiling mass of black clouds interspersed with violent flashes of lightning. A storm waiting to be unleashed. And more distant, the muffled signatures of the millions of people on Nar Shaddaa. But here, in her hand, the hologram glows bright behind her mind’s eye.

“Now just follow that path to the end, tell the Force to open it.”

She can see it’s internal mechanisms, concentrates on pushing the Force through it’s winding pathways until it unlocks. Yes! There, almost there, and she can see it open, and then—nothing. Something blocks her from that final, crucial step. Rey frowns but soldiers on, trying again and again, each time with the same result as the last.

“It won’t, I can’t—” she tries to explain. The holocron glows dimly for a few precious seconds, and then the light fades out to nothing. “Can you?”

Kylo shakes his head, “That seems to be a Jedi holocron, not Sith. They won’t open for the dark side, and even if they did, I doubt it’s gatekeeper would be too keen to speak with me.” But he takes it from her hand anyway.

“And have you? Opened a Sith one?” Rey asks, only a little ashamed at the curiosity clear in her voice.

Kylo’s gloved fingers trace along the dull silver latticework of the holocron, mapping out each metal line and curve. He nods, “Snoke was a certain type of collector. He liked reminders of the failures of others; relics of those that had been too weak to survive, including the Sith. He allowed me access to a few. Only those explaining saber forms or specific Force techniques, and always under his supervision.” A dark look crosses his face. “He made sure I only ever had one master,” he growls.

He tries to open it then, and the holocron begins glowing again, but like with Rey, it stays dimly lit and eventually peters out.

“Some holocrons also required a memory crystal in order to be activated. Without it, these things are no more than useless hunks of glass and metal.”

Rey’s stomach drops to her feet. Can this really be the end? She takes it back, disappointment bitter on her tongue. She tries once again to open it, but this time letting the Force lead her. It wanted her to find this, and there must be a reason why. Please let me in she urges, but that final lock refuses to budge. Rey remembers then, about those difficult and finicky hauls on Jakku that were difficult to extract. In particular, she thinks about the navicomputer she’d found buried in one of the upper decks of a fallen Star Destroyer, how she’d had to hack it out once she’d realized her more delicate tools wouldn’t be able to remove it.

_You know I can take whatever I want._

Rey gasps, heart racing in her chest. This might—this might work.

“Have you ever heard of two people being needed to open a holocron?”

“No, not in anything I’ve come across,” he answers.

“Well,” Rey says, walking over to place the holocron on a small table. “This’ll be interesting then. I think we should open it together, the both of us at the same time.”

Kylo stands opposite of her, on the other side of the table, blocking the violet light that falls through the viewports,casting Rey in darkness. Without out another word, they both reach their hands out, palms down as they channel the Force.

_Please let me in._

_Open for me._

Over and over, that mantra, and neither has opened their mouths but she can hear him just as clear as if he’d spoken aloud. The dark and the light swirl between them as the holocron levitates and its light, it’s glowing brighter, radiant and that final lock clicks—and Rey turns her head away as a burst of bright light erupts forth.

When she manages to blink away the light spots swimming in her vision, Rey stares at the sight before her. There on the table is the holocron, except now a hologram of a man has emerged, casting the room in a blue glow.

“Greetings, student,” the hologram says, an older male figure no taller than the length of her palm and dressed in something similar to Jedi robes. “I was known as Je’daii Temple Master Ketu. What is your name?” he asks, sharp eyes intent on Rey.

She stares, amazed at what appears before her, and Kylo, too, has come closer, dark eyes intent on the hologram.

“Ah, there are two of you I see. It has not been often that two students have been required to open my holocron.”

“And why is that?” questions Kylo. He looks intrigued, and softer, somehow, bathed in the blue glow of the projection.

“The lessons I have to impart on the nature of the Force rely on balance between the Ashla, the Bogan, and the Bendu. Any student who is unbalanced would have difficulty accessing my holocron. But you two,” he glances between them, “you two were able to achieve it. So tell me, what are your names?”

“I’m Rey, but what—? The Ashla, what’s that?”

“The light, the dark, and the balance, all core tenants of the Je’daii Order,” he answers, then looks to Kylo.

“I am Kylo Ren.”

The hologram flickers, “No, I’m looking for your true name, dark jedi.”

Kylo’s Force signature trembled beside her, the curiosity replaced with anger. “I am no jedi!”

Master Ketu blinks, unimpressed by his outburst, “No true darksider would have been able to open my holocron, even with the help of a Je’daii,” he glances at Rey. “So I will ask again, what is your name?”

Seconds pass, the silence stretching on as Kylo gives no indication of answering.

“I sense much conflict in you. The dark side reigns over you, causing discord within. If you had been one of my students, I would have sent you to Akar Kesh for meditation.”

“And what do you know of me?” Kylo sneers.

“I’m interested in your lessons, Master Ketu,” Rey interrupts, shooting a dark look Kylo’s way. Leave it to him to challenge a long dead Jedi master.

“Ah,” Ketu contemplates. “You’re very strong in the Force, Rey. There is so much light in you, and darkness too, as it should be,” he declares.

“What do you mean, exactly? I thought,” she doesn't let herself look at Kylo,”that the dark side was supposed to seduce you, for you to use it for selfish reasons.”

“In light, there is a darkness and in the darkness, a light. It is the way of us all. Be a prisoner of neither Bogan nor Ashla. Strive to live in balance.”

“Yes but how?” she presses. It’s one thing to say you need the dark and the light to achieve balance, and another to execute it.

“Who is your master?” he wonders. “Balance should have been one of your first lessons.”

“We are a long time away from whenever you are from,” answers Kylo. “There are no more Jedi, or Sith, and certainly no more Je’daii the way you’re describing them.”

The hologram seems to go dim for a moment, and Master Ketu’s eyes, which had already seemed old, grow older still. “I suppose I am, and yet you two remain. And Rey, I do not need to ask to know she is a student of the Je’daii, following the same path as thousands of pupils before her.”

Unexpected pride fills Rey’s chest. For so long she’d felt as if she’d been stumbling blindly in the dark, scavenging what she could from the few lessons Luke Skywalker had imparted to her, and whatever tidbits she gathered from the texts, cobbled together to shape her understanding of the Force. She’d felt too often like a fraud, a child playing dress up in someone else’s clothes, the mantle of Jedi ill fitting on her shoulders. But Master Ketu, who had lived in a time when the Jedi, (or something like them) had thrived, he can see it.

“And to answer your question Rey, let’s have you meditate.”

Rey nods, folding her legs neatly beneath herself, eye level now with the base of the holocron.

“You as well, dark jedi.”

Kylo makes no move to get down, “I never was much good at meditating.”

“If you are not here to learn, I would advise you to leave,” Ketu says, voice stern.

She stares up at him, watching to see what he’ll do. At the feeling of her eyes on him Kylo sighs, then settles next to her, the solid weight of him impossible to ignore.

“Now close your eyes, allow the Force to guide you. Seek out your darker emotions.”

The tide of anger that simmers underneath her skin yearns to break free. She remembers Plutt’s goons trying to steal BB-8, the crackle of saber meeting saber in the forests of Starkiller Base, the reverberation of Luke Skywalker’s staff against her own.

“You’re doing well. Go deeper,” says a voice, though it sounds distant. “Now what did you do with that, with your anger?”

“My friends, I was protecting my friends,” she answers.

“Anger can be of the dark side, yes, but it can also fuel the light to fight against injustice, in the protection of a friend. That anger has a purpose, a selfless one, and that is how you can begin to balance the two. Do not let it control you, but do not suppress it either.”

Rey can feel the Force within her, illuminating the dark corners of her soul and throwing them in sharp relief. Her fear, her pain, like holding opaque glass against the brightness of the sun, seeing more clearly its imperfections, but also its beauty. Beside her though, Kylo’s body shakes, the darkness around him pulsing like a living thing. Sweat beads at his temple, clenched fists resting atop his thighs. Rey reaches out, brushing up against the edge of his consciousness—and recoils, too late. An invisible grip pulls her in, down into the depths of his mind.

_Darkness. Blood. A burning temple. The high pitched scream of a saber igniting, and Luke’s face bathed in a sickly green glow. Her own face, dripping with tears. Anger, and fear, so much fear. Where is she? Where is_ Kylo _? Rey feels buffeted from all sides by_ the the darkness _as if she were being dragged out to open ocean by a strong riptide. His pain is her pain, his anger coursing through her veins. She tries to shout, but she has no mouth, no corporal form in the confines of the shadows._

_Concentrate. She is not Kylo Ren, she is Rey of Jakku, and this darkness is not her own. She focuses, lets her senses guide her, and piece by piece, she feels her body form._

_“Kylo?!” she shouts, but there is no response. When she opens her eyes she_ is alone save _for the pitch black darkness that surrounds her. She feels herself begin to panic, but Master Ketu’s words ring in her head; do not let it control you. Fear, she’s afraid for herself and for Kylo, of what’s happening to him. She lets it transform; fear transmuting into empathy for his well_ being, _and gathers the Force close._

_Show him to me._

_And it does. He’s on the ground before her, fists clenched into the dark strands of his hair, back heaving like a wild animal as he sucks in great lungfuls of air. Behind him, a wicked storm rages, inching ever closer to them._

_“Kylo, you have to stop! Let go!” Rey calls, but he doesn’t seem to hear. “Kylo!” The storm is almost upon them, moving with a preternatural quickness and ferocity that whips the wind around them. Rey’s hair lashes around her face, stinging her face and eyes. She crouches beside him, placing a hand on his shoulder._

_“Ben, please!” she cries, as the black clouds rush over them. Ben’s eyes snap to hers, wet at the corners and feral with pain._

_“Rey,” he gasps, grasping onto her hand like a lifeline, and she’s jerked back into her own body and mind._

The energy in the room crackles, the Force humming a discordant note.

“What,” Rey gasps, body slick with sweat, “what was that?”

“You didn’t warn me the both of you were bonded. I would have advised you to proceed with caution,” Master Ketu warns, the worry clear in his voice.

Kylo lunges for the holocron, deadly as a kath hound.

“No!” Rey yells, blocking his path.

“He’s useless!” he spits. “You should have left it in whatever Force forsaken place you found it.” His eyes are fever bright in a too pale face. It’s a scuffle, the muscles in Rey’s arms straining with the effort of holding him back.

“Why do you deny yourself the light side? I’ve seen it in you, no matter how much you try to deny it. As long as you ignore it, your spirit will know no peace. This is my first lesson for you, dark jedi—without balance you are master of none, and prisoner of yourself.”

And then it clicks off, and the holocron is again nothing more than dull metal and tarnished glass. Kylo sags within the confines of her arms, as if he were a toy whose strings had been cut. Rey releases his body, and makes to stand up, when his hand wraps around her wrist, loose enough that she could pull free if she wanted to.

“I did not mean for you to see all that. Please believe it was not my intention.”

“I know.” She can’t deny the sincerity of his words and she watches as before her eyes the explosive anger from moments before drains away.

“I’m sorry,” and he’s looking at her now. “Not just for that, but—” he gulps, a bead of sweat sliding down the ridge of his prominent adam’s apple “—but for that day on the Supremacy. You are not nothing. You have never been nothing.”

Rey feels a prickling sensation at the corners of her eyes, but she won’t cry. She can’t. She’s spilled too many tears for him already. She takes a deep breath and instead answers, “What are you really doing here, Kylo?” She can tell they are not the words he wanted to hear. They’re not the words she wanted to say, either, but it’s all she can allow them both.

“I don’t know,” he whispers. “It all seemed so simple once, the path my destiny would take. And now that it has arrived I don’t know what to do.”

A beat, an unending moment in which she stares into the dark depths of his eyes, crawling a little closer.

“You hate it,” she realizes, feeling his mind tremble as she reaches out to him, as his eyes widen. “The bureaucracy, the backstabbing and treachery, the inescapable loneliness.”

And now, it’s Kylo who leans away, her wrist slipping from his hand, “No—”

“Yes. But, but you don’t hate the control, the rule over others. This isn’t the way the galaxy is supposed to be.”

“And the New Galactic Republic was any better? The Order has bureaucracy, yes, but at least they do not squabble like children while entire worlds starve. Worlds like Jakku, left to the mercy of smugglers and criminals.”

“So you’ll give them order whether they want it or not?”

“Half the galaxy doesn’t know what’s good for them,” he says.

“People aren’t supposed to be ruled over Kylo, why can’t you see that? They want safety, yes, food in their bellies and a roof over their head, but not like this.”

“It’s already done, Rey. The First Order rules.”

Rey stares at him, at the conviction that shines desperate behind his eyes. She begins to reach for him, pauses, wondering if this is the right thing to do, and then does it anyway. Her hand slides up his jaw, hands coming to cradle his face in the palm of her hands. His breathing stops, both of them aware of the hum of electricity that surges between their skin. Rey finds she is surprised by the softness of his skin, the high curve of his cheekbone as her thumbs sweep over them.

“Nothing is really over. Your destiny isn’t written, Kylo,” she stresses.

“My path was decided long before I was born. The Force chose me, as it did with my grandfather, to shape the galaxy,” he answers, voice breaking even as he says the words.

“But even as the Force guides us, it doesn’t _control_ us. Like every other sentient in the universe we have to define our own paths. That’s why the First Order will fall. You have to give people a choice,” she says, noticing how close they’ve become. Her face is only inches from his, like two planets orbiting the other, unable to escape the gravity of each other. “You have to give them a choice, and the only thing you can do is hope they choose the right thing in the end, _Ben_.”

Ben trembles beneath her hands, their breaths mingling in the space between their mouths. Rey’s eyes flick down to his lips,and then glance back up at his eyes, only to find them dark and intent on her. Would it be so bad, she thinks, to feel them, if only once? And then, from one moment to the next, she feels the softness of his mouth against her own, and the warmth of his hands coming to settle on her hips. Rey is kissing him then, desperate, outlined in chiaroscuro by the light of the Smuggler’s Moon.

It’s a desperate, longing kiss. Ben’s wide mouth pressed against her own hard enough to bruise. She can’t tell if it’s a good kiss, has nothing to compare it to, but the wet pull of Ben’s lips against her own ignites an ache deep within her. She slides her fingers into the thick strands of his hair, desperate to know if they’re as soft as she’s imagined them, late at night, alone in her cot while the rest of the Resistance slept around her. They run through her hands like shimmersilk, and they’re somehow even softer than she imagined. Ben moans beneath her, hands gripping her hips and pulling her into the cradle of his lap.

_You will break your own heart if you don't stop,_ warns a voice within her even as she wraps her slim legs around the thick trunk of Ben’s torso. Rey pushes the voice down in favor of memorizing the exact sound Ben makes when she sucks on his lower lip hard enough to bruise. To her surprise, she feels him lean forward, feels cool air on her lips as he moves his mouth to the edge of her jaw.

“Lean backwards,” he orders gently, voice low and soft.

A shiver runs up her spine as her back comes to rest against the coolness of the tiled floor. She can feel him above her, can feel the heat of his chest above her own, not quite touching but undeniably there. Feels it, as he slides one of his knees between the juncture of her thighs, and gasps—can’t help it—against the delicious pressure.

“Is this alright?” he asks, his own breathing coming fast and short as he looks down at her, eyes liquid and dark. No one’s ever looked at her like this before, she thinks, like she’s beautiful and precious and like she hung the stars in the night sky. Rey closes her eyes and nods, overwhelmed. She can feel Ben bend down, placing a kiss at the corner of her lips before moving to the pulse point beating furiously at the base of her jaw. It’s torture, the way he nips and sucks at that point, slight jolts of pleasure-pain soothed by the languid heat of his tongue.

Heat pools low in her belly, and Rey wants to squeeze her legs together to alleviate the ache at the apex of her thighs, but Ben’s own body blocks her. He shifts a little and oh, she finds if she undulates her hips against the firm thickness of his thigh, a sweet pressure arcs through her. She moans, long and low, hands sliding back into his hair to pull his mouth back to hers. Ben is all too eager to oblige, giving one final sucking kiss to the long line of her throat before bringing his lips to hers. It occurs to Rey that she should feel trapped by this, by his weight bearing on her and his arms bracketing her body, but she finds she only wants more. She notices it then, a hard pressure against her upper thigh, hot and thick.

“Is that?” she asks, unsure how to say the words out loud.

Color rises high on Ben’s cheeks, and she senses the heady cocktail of his emotions: lust and pleasure, awe and embarrassment.

She presses a chaste kiss to his cheek, “Can I?”

“ _Yes, please anything,_ ” he chokes out.

She slides her hand down his chest, between their bodies before cupping the heavy weight of his cock in her hands. He groans, deep, as if the actions hurts him and Rey stiffens, worried, begins to pull away. Ben grabs her wrist, holding her hand in place.

“Please,” he rasps against her lips and he lets her feel a reflection of the pleasure that simmers at the base of his spine.

“Alright,” she agrees, so she grips him a little harder, sliding her hand over his pants as he ruts into her hand. Soon they’ve established a rhythm, writhing and rocking against each other as they chase that peak, higher and higher. Rey thinks she might be going light-headed from lack of oxygen, too busy kissing Ben’s soft mouth. She rocks harder against him, grinding herself on the length of his thigh and she’s almost there, wherever _there_ is, she just, she needs,—

She sends an image to Ben, his large hands cupping her breasts, squeezing them, and he doesn’t hesitate, hands delving beneath the edge of her shirt.

“Gloves off,” she manages to ask, wanting to feel the warmth of his skin on hers.

The white of his teeth glint in the darkened room as he takes the tip of one glove between them and yanks them off. And oh, that feels lovely, the warmth of his wide palm sliding up the planes of her stomach, the edges of her ribs. Ben rubs his fingers against the outline of her nipples beneath her breast band, and all she can do is moan his name, over and over, how sweet it tastes leaving her mouth.

“Rey, please, I want to see you come, won’t you do that for me?” he gaps, squeezing her breasts in his huge hands and that’s it, that’s what pushes her over the edge, pleasure whiting out her vision as she pants, “Ben, Ben _Ben_.”

When she finally comes back into her own body, she catches Ben’s own eyes slipping shut, the way his hips stutter, once, twice, before he comes with a long moan, lips brushing her as she feels his pleasure crest. He looks so beautiful like this, she thinks, with his lips swollen and red, face slack with pleasure.

Afterward, he flips them over so Rey rests atop him, at the perfect angle to rest her head in the space between his shoulder and neck. She likes it there, the smell of Ben concentrated, that clean soap smell and his own musk. Rey’s never really had time to notice it, but now, like this, she files it away for later, in the secret chambers of her heart.

Minutes or hours pass like this, just the sounds of their breathes loud in the otherwise quiet room.

“You never did tell me how you knew I was on Nar Shaddaa,” she says at length.

He stiffens beneath her, and suddenly the ease and tranquility in the room vanishes. He takes so long to answer Rey ends up convinced he won’t answer her at all. Ben breathes, and she feels it, laying atop him, the way his lungs expand and push out.

“The drink I saw in the bond, the one in your hand, I recognized it. A Twistler, it’s made from a rare fruit native to—Corellia. Very difficult to find otherwise, and so I know of only a few establishments that will serve it. The Corellian Sector here on Nar Shaddaa is one of them.”

She catches a glimpse of a memory: _a small boy with dark curls sits on his father’s lap. A younger Han Solo laughs at the disgust on the boy’s face. “Trust me, kid, every true Corellian thinks they know the best place to buy their liquor.”_

And then the bubble she’s built around this moment of their bursts, and reality comes rushing in.

“What now, Ben?” she asks, lips brushing the sensitive skin along his pale throat.

His thumb rubs soothing circles into the exposed skin of her hip where her shirt has ridden up. “In the morning, you leave. I brought a civilian light freighter with me, it's simple enough to pilot, even alone. For now, we should go to sleep. Is that, alright? You can take the bed if you’d like,” he offers, eyes dim and sad.

It’s terrible, a horrible idea, she should grab her things immediately and catch the first transport off this planet and forget everything that has happened in the last twenty four hours.

“No, it’s alright, we both fit,” Rey hears herself say instead, planting one last kiss against the softness of his lips before getting up, even as her heart breaks. She does not look him in the eyes as they get into the hotel bed, still dressed save their shoes. The space between their bodies might as well be light years, they each crowd against their side of the bed. She works on breathing in and out, praying that sleep will come quickly. She’s almost out when Rey feels a tentative hand slide across the crisp linen sheets, coming to rest against the edge of her own hand.

She turns onto her side, grabbing the hand to pull one of Ben’s thick arms over her stomach, cradling into his side. The heat of his body is comforting in a way she never anticipated, and it’s with this thought that she drifts to sleep, Ben’s nose buried in the hair at the base of her neck.

 

* * *

 

The watery yellow light of morning wakes her first, and Rey spends precious seconds counting the moles on Ben’s face, tracing the patterns over and over with her eyes. She notices the shadows his lashes cast on his cheeks, the way his face softens like it rarely is in the waking world. She memorizes this moment; the feel of his warm body next to hers, and presses a feather-light kiss to the edge of his mouth, careful not to wake him. Then, she presses a hand to his forehead and sends him deeper into sleep with the Force.

She gets out of the bed, grabs her belongings, and walks out of the hotel room. She doesn’t look back.

A couple of blocks away she steals a speeder and two levels below she slips onto an unsupervised solo light freighter. It’s not until the blue-white lines of hyperspace surround her that she relaxes, the holocron in her pocket a strangely comforting weight. She’s one step closer to completing her training, and perhaps Master Ketu will be able to help with translating the texts.

As for Ben, she believes the words she said to him the night before; you have to give people a choice, and you must have hope.

And Rey’s got enough hope for them both.

**Author's Note:**

> I had lots of fun reading up on wookiepedia and integrating both canon and legends stuff into my story. If you guys are interested in checking them out, here are some links.
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> Who was [Master Ketu?](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ketu)
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> [Ancient Je'daii Order](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Je%27daii_Order)
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> [Akar Kesh](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Akar_Kesh) , or the Temple of Balance. 
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> [Twistler Drink](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Twistler)
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> I'm also on [tumblr!](http://www.thekesselrun.tumblr.com/)


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